Calmar SS Co., New York (1927-1976)
See also: Ore SS Co., New York (pre-World War I
through post-World War II)
These two companies were subsidiaries of the Bethlehem Steel Company, the second
largest in the United States and, at the time, the second largest in the world.
Like US Steel, Alcoa, and other companies, Bethlehem found general shipping
companies unresponsive to its needs. Ore was a purely proprietary company that
carried only Bethlehem cargoes--ore to the mills and steel to markets--while
Calmar operated between the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, taking steel products
westbound and lumber eastbound. By the late 1940s, Bethlehem operated not only
these but three other steamship companies. After closing down Calmar in 1976,
Bethlehem still operated one remaining carrier, the Interocean Shipping Company,
until 1986. Both Calmar and Ore flew blue flags with white upper and lower edges
and the company initial, "C" or "O" in white stencil-style block letter.

Caltex Oil Co is a joint venture of Standard Oil of California (SoCal, now
Chevron) and Texaco, originally for exploration, pumping, and refining in the
Persian Gulf. The emblem is strongly reminiscent of Texaco's, but (at least
according to
Stewart, 1953) on SoCal's blue field rather than Texaco's green.

image by Joe McMillan

However, www.steamship.net (no longer available) shows a picture that
appears to have the Caltex emblem on a green field, although the difference may
be a result of photography lighting or fading on the china pattern from which
the photograph was taken.

Carnival Cruise Lines was founded by Ted Anson in 1972 and has since become
the foundation for the largest cruise line operation in the world, Carnival
Corporation. Carnival acquired Holland America in 1989, Seabourn in 1992,
Costa in 1997, Cunard in 1998, and P&O Princess Cruises in 2003. Carnival
Cruise Lines proper operates 21 ships, each carrying from 2,000 to 3,000
passengers and ranging in size up to more than 300 meters and 110,000 tons.
It bills itself as the most popular cruise line in the world. Its
destinations are mainly in the Caribbean, New England and the Canadian
Maritimes, the west coast of Mexico, Alaska, and between the US west coast
and Hawaii. The flag is red with a white letter O filled with blue.
Source: Personal observation aboard M/S Carnival Miracle last week; it can
also be seen at the corporate website, www.carnivalcorp.com.
Although a US corporation, most of Carnival's ships are registered in PanamaJoe McMillan, 9 July 2005

Catskill Evening Line
A Hudson River company that operated between New York and the Catskill Mountain
region until 1928. The companies were identified according to the time of their
daily upstream departures.
Source: www.steamship.net (no longer available)

Central & South American Telegraph Co., New York
Flown by cable laying ships. The same flag was used by the associated Mexican
Telegraph Co, also of New York. The flag was blue with a white lightning flash
issuing from the upper hoist, running diagonally between two white stars, each
with two points up, in upper fly and lower hoist.
Source: Lloyd's House Flags, 1912

Central Gulf Lines, New Orleans/Dover, Del. (1947-present)
A company notable primarily for having succeeded in making money with the LASH
(lighter-aboard-ship) technology, an alternative to containers in which barges
are hoisted aboard the ship and carried to the destination. Services run from
inland coal transportation on the Mississippi and its tributaries to automobile
carrying between Japan and the United States. Flag is a red swallowtail with an
eight-pointed white compass star.US Navy's 1961 H.O.

Joe McMillan, 8 September 2001

image by Jarig Bakker

A second flag has been sighted, by myself in 1989 amongst others, with
uncertainty as to whether it is swallow-tailed. On the star of this is black
lettering comprising a large "C" enclosing a smaller "G" in turn in closing the
start of the smaller word "LINES". My sighting was
ashore, I do not know about the others, but there is a suggestion that it is a
shore-only flag.Neale Rosanoski, 1 February 2004

Chamberlain & Phelps, New York
Operated a line of sail packets between New York and Liverpool--i.e., bringing
Irish immigrants to New York--in the 1840s and 50s. A distinctive flag of five
vertical stripes alternating red and white.
Source: chart of "Private Signals of the Merchants of New York"

Chambers & Heiser, New York
A mid-nineteenth century company with an interesting house flag: a blue hoist
and a white fly with three tails, the middle one red.
Source: chart of "Private Signals of the Merchants of New York"

Chevron Shipping, Los Angeles (1895-present)(and predecessors)
Chevron Shipping is the tanker subsidiary of Chevron Corporation, the successor
of the Standard Oil (California) unit of the Rockefeller Standard Oil Trust of
the early 20th century. The company's roots were in the Pacific Coast Oil Co,
founded in 1879, which went into the shipping business in 1895 and merged with
Standard Oil in 1900. In 1906, Standard Oil (California) was set up within the
trust, and in 1911 it was spun off as one of the new companies when the courts
broke up Standard Oil on antitrust grounds. Over time, Socal, as it was called,
set up a variety of shipping subsidiaries including the California Transport
Corp, the California Tanker Co, and the Socal Marine Department. All these were
consolidated in 1957 into the California Shipping Co, which was renamed Chevron
Shipping when SoCal became the Chevron Corporation in 1984. The flags are those
of:

California Transport Corp. - The same acronym in red letters on a
white disk on a blue field.
Source:
Stewart (1953)

Joe McMillan, 11 September 2001

image by Jarig Bakker

Brown 1958 shows a different version of a blue field bearing the chevron
outlined white and above it the white letters "CALSO" with the "L" being
taller. It also shows a similar flag with a red field for California Tanker Co.Neale Rosanoski, 1 February 2004

Standard Oil Company of California - The red, white, and blue
chevron logo on a white disk. The chevron was first used as a trademark of
Standard Oil of California in 1931. Chevron then became a trade name under which
the company marketed fuels in parts of the country where other successors to the
Rockefeller Trust had the rights to use the name "Standard." As noted above, the
company changed its official name to "Chevron" in 1984. I believe its tankers
now fly a white flag with the current version of the trademark, a modification
of that shown here with the name "Chevron" above the chevrons in black, but I
don't know that for a fact.
Sources:
Stewart & Styring (1963),
Styring (1971)

Joe McMillan, 11 September 2001

image
by Jarig Bakker, 15 October 2005

The flag did become the white field with the chevron and above it "Chevron" in
black. Presumably there is a new flag following the October 9th 2001 merger with
Texaco Inc. forming Chevrontexaco Corporation.Neale Rosanoski, 1 February 2004

The announcement on the web of a lecture by Bob Barde (2 Dec. 2004):
http://www.chsa.org/events/lectures.php?event_id=52 provides some
information. Chinese and Chinese Americans wanted to have their own firm
dedicated to immigrant transportation in the Pacific, an activity until then
monopolized by Western and Japanese companies. Founded in 1915, Chinese Mail
stopped its operations seven years later.

From Shehong Chen, "Being Chinese. Becoming Chinese American" at
http://www.press.uillinois.edu/epub/books/chen/ch3.html:
Highlights of this chapter: China Mail established October, 1915, as an
expression of Chinese American (anti-Japanese) nationalism and the will to
economic autonomy; it was a US firm rejecting a venture with the Chinese
government. In fact, the Chinese community enthusiastically bought shares.

"A grand ceremony was held to raise the company flag on the ship. Invited
to
the ceremony were 1,000 American Chinese and 1,000 non-Chinese Americans. A
prayer was offered by a Chinese Presbyterian minister. The China set out on
its maiden voyage for Asia under the new flag on October 30, 1915”.

Chinese, American or not, patronized the company and the future looked
bright but by 1917 the cost of buying and repairing a second ship caused
financial problems. A new company, heir to the first one but now with some
Westerners on the board, was seen as selling out to non-Chinese interests.
After WWI , the growing competition led to the firm’s looking for fresh
capital in China and Hong Kong but to no avail. Growing debts caused China
Mail to go bankrupt in 1923.
The author concludes that the company was one of the factors leading to a
heightened Chinese awareness, specifically within the US but at the same
time concerned with the many problems the motherland was facing.

The house flag is a blue swallowtail
with a white cross throughout and a red diamond bearing a white five-pointed
star in the cross’s centre, similar to that above, but with
the blue and white colours are reversed. The company seat was San Francisco.

However, in this version the diamond is bigger and two of its points – the
upper and the lower one – are much sharper.

I have been unable to figure out what the precise connection is between
these two firms, if there really were two firms. This leaves us, for the
moment, with a variant house flag.Jan Mertens, 24 August 2005

History:

As the company is situated in the Tontine Building, it's 1843 at the
earliest, when the name "Tontine Coffee House" changed to "Tontine
Building". Not much, of a limit, but still.

There are two entries for Therese (ship) with a master called Wallace in
the Mystic Seaport Ship Register Search, from 1858 and 1859. Neither mention
Church, unfortunately. Were the lines of these shipping companies sailed by
ships actually owned by others?

At
http://www.genealogybank.com/gbnk/books/sourcelist/1.html a source from
1853 is given as "C.H. Church & Co's Star Line for San Francisco. The
magnificent A1 clipper ship Silver Star ... is loading at Pier 9 East River
...". The type of source is not mentioned, but the text suggests this is a
sailing card as well.

In 1858, a Silver Star still sails the route:
http://www.invaluable.com/auction-lot/books-1-p-35019a8f35 shows a
sailing card auctioned at PBA Galleries Auctions & Appraisers: "SILVER STAR.
Clipper ship sailing card, on porcelain coated stock, printed in silver,
black, blue & red ... New York: July 1858 Rare sailing card for the vessel
in C.H. Church & Co's Star Line, Thomas F. Wade the commander". Again,
Mystic Seaport's Ship Registry lists the ship the master and the building
year, the latter being 1956 would suggest the line replaced the ship, but no
mention of Church.

The New York Times gives some hits as well, but none before 1853. (They
did print shipping messages for San Francisco already throughout 1852, so
it's not for lack of reporting.) Apparently, 1853 saw the start of the Star
Line. I also can't find any mention after the Therese in 1859.

Mystic Seaport lists and pictures a house flag for Church,
Cliff & Co., New York, no year given, at
http://library.mysticseaport.org/initiative/SignalImage.cfm?BibID=36294&ChapterNo=14, which is part of "A Directory of Private Signals Flown by American
Merchant Sail: One Thousand House Flags of Ship Owners, Shipping Merchants
and Shipping Agents; 2001-2002", from the William L. Crothers Collection.
This particular flag, 14.1.10, is covered in William L. Crothers Collection
(Coll. 282), (box 2, folder 21) Reference 51: "Shipping
House Flags" by H. Percy Ashley. The flag shown is similar to the flag
of C.H. Church & Co., but has a diamond that is higher than it's wide. BTW,
there's also: ... (folder 22) Reference 52: "Shipping House Flags" by Capt. H.
Percy Ashley. It may well be it's the same material but merely too much to fit
in one folder. In fact, most of the William L. Crothers Collection is about
house flags, hence the index of One Thousand of them, I guess.

Considering that H. Percy Ashley was born in 1868, according to
the Library of Congress, this last source is likely to be more recent, which
suggests Church, Cliff & Co. may be a successor company. It might be C.H.
Church & Co. first, then C.H. Church & Son when Church Jr. joins the firm,
and finally Church, Cliff & Co. after the father has left the firm and a new
partner has been found. However, to confirm that, we'd have to find
information on the other two. Other scenarios, of course, are possible as
well.Peter Hans van den Muijzenberg, 1 March 2012

Circle Shipping Co., New York
I believe this must be the company that runs the Circle Line ferries around New
York City, so named because of the route around the island of Manhattan. Perhaps
a New Yorker can confirm.
Source:
US Navy's 1961 H.O.
Joe McMillan, 14 September 2001

More likely I would imagine this to be Circle Shipping Co. Inc. of New York
shown Lloyds Shipowners 1958-9 as operating the tanker "Hunters Point" of Globe
Tankers Inc.Neale Rosanoski, 1 February 2004

Cities Service Oil Co., New York
Predecessor of the company now known as Citgo. An earlier version of this flag
apparently had a much more complex version of this logo in black on white.
Sources:
Stewart (1953),
US Navy's 1961 H.O.

Joe McMillan, 14 September 2001

Founded in the early 1900s, Cities Service was noted for the first long-distance
natural gas pipeline in the US (1,000 miles from Amarillo, Texas to Chicago,
Illinois, completed in 1931). The company is based in Tulsa, but owned by
Petroleos de Venezuela, S.A. since the 1990s. The company changed its name to
CITGO in 1965.Phil Nelson, 20 October 2003

image by Jarig Bakker

The original flag pre-late 1950s design was a smaller version of this emblem (in
black and white as stated) being within a similar frame forming a sort of wide
annulet which bore at top "CITIES SERVICE OIL(S)" [arced in the shape of the
annulet] and at base within a black outlined oblong the company motto "ONCE,
ALWAYS" [in a straight line] (there are slight differences in the lettering as
shown by Loughran 1979 and Brown 1951. A new flag was adopted in 1974, green
with a 3 shades of red triangle edged white and below this the white letters 'CITGO".